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Collecting feedback from students through course, program and other evaluation questionnaires has become a costly and time consuming process for most colleges. Converting to data collection through the internet, rather than completion on paper, can result in a cheaper and more efficient process. This article examines several research questions which need to be answered to establish that results collected by the two modes of administration are equivalent. Data were gathered for a program evaluation questionnaire from undergraduate students at a university in Hong Kong. Students were able to choose between completion on paper or through the internet. In six of the seven Faculties the number of responses through each mode was roughly the same. Students in the Engineering Faculty favored the internet. Scores on the 14 out of 18 scales in the instrument showed small differences by mode of response, which became smaller still with controls for pertinent demographic variables. The main response question addressed in the study was whether there was any difference in the way respondents to the two modes interpreted the questions. The study demonstrated the equivalence of the two data sets by showing that both could be fitted to a common model with structural equation modeling (SEM). Five levels of tests of invariance further confirmed the comparability of data by mode of administration. This study, therefore suggests that changing to internet collection for course and program evaluations will not affect the comparability of ratings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A letter to the editor is presented in response to an article related to ranking of India's top institutions on the basis of number of research papers in the Scopus citation database over the past five years in a 2015 issue.

The paper is the first attempt to integrate microdata on universities and firms across most European countries in order to disentangle the impact of knowledge spillovers from human capital (graduates) and intellectual capital (codified research output) on the performance of firms. Data cover all Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) registered in the official European Tertiary Education Register (ETER). Data on performance of firms are from ORBIS and refer to change in the 2011–2015 period in turnover, total assets, intangible assets, and employment. Firms are georeferred and the spillovers from all HEIs located at a given distance are summed and integrated. The findings suggest that, among knowledge spillovers, the creation of human capital via education of students has a larger impact than the circulation of research knowledge. Moreover, the two factors seem to be complements rather than substitutes. Spatial proximity is important for embodied knowledge spillovers (i.e. educated people), while for codified and disembodied spillovers (citations to publications) the spatial dimension is less relevant. The findings have important managerial and policy-making consequences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Higher education institutions are moving to design and implement teacher-facing learning analytics (LA) dashboards with the hope that instructors can extract deep insights about student learning and make informed decisions to improve their teaching. While much attention has been paid to developing teacher-facing dashboards, less is known about how they are designed, implemented and evaluated. This paper presents a systematic literature review of existing studies reporting on teacher-facing LA dashboards. Out of the 1968 articles retrieved from several databases, 50 articles were included in the final analysis. Guided by several frameworks, articles were coded based on the following dimensions: purpose, theoretical grounding, stakeholder involvement, ethics and privacy, design, implementation, and evaluation criteria. The findings show that most dashboards are designed to increase teachers' awareness but with limited actionable insights to allow intervention. Moreover, while teachers are involved in the design process, this is mainly at the exploratory/problem definition stage, with little input beyond this stage. Most dashboards were prescriptive, less customisable, and implicit about the theoretical constructs behind their designs. In addition, dashboards are deployed at prototype and pilot stages, and the evaluation is dominated by self-reports and users' reactions with limited focus on changes to teaching and learning. Besides, only one study considered privacy as a design requirement. Based on the findings of the study and synthesis of existing literature, we propose a four-dimensional checklist for planning, designing, implementing and evaluating LA dashboards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This conceptual point-of-view essay focuses on the authors' teaching experiences in undergraduate business education at Brazilian and German Universities. In line with the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) and based on autoethnographical writing, the paper explores the question of how university business education professors can help their students become more prepared for the job market by establishing university–industry partnerships. This discussion fills a particularly pertinent gap regarding knowledge transfer, skill development, and discrepancies between academic expectations in relation to practice-based education, as well as professors' pedagogical sensibility for students' preparation in higher education. Overall, the significance of the research lies in the potential to improve the effectiveness and relevance of business education. This can lead to more effective knowledge transfer and skill development among students. The study concludes by stressing the importance of university–industry collaborations for academics and students. Students might be better prepared for job employment in such situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many higher education institutions around the world are engaged in efforts to tackle climate change. This takes place by not only reducing their own carbon footprint but also by educating future leaders and contributing valuable research and expertise to the global effort to combat climate change. However, there is a need for studies that identify the nature of their engagement on the topic, and the extent to which they are contributing towards addressing the many problems associated with climate change. Against this background, this paper describes a study that consisted of a review of the literature and the use of case studies, which outline the importance of university engagement in climate change and describe its main features. The study identified the fact that even though climate change is a matter of great relevance to universities, its coverage in university programmes is not as wide as one could expect. Based on the findings, the paper also lists the challenges associated with the inclusion of climate change in university programmes. Finally, it describes some of the measures which may be deployed in order to maximise the contribution of higher education towards handling the challenges associated with a changing climate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the contemporary digitalised knowledge society, work-integrated professional development is an important and continuous activity. Continuous professional development should preferably be a hybrid format, where academia collaborates with industry and the surrounding society in a multi-directed exchange of ideas. Continuous professional development is today conducted in a blend of workplace activities, and in technology enhanced online environments. A complex blend for professionals that at the same time are working full-time with their ordinary jobs. The need for a support model to navigate in these new digital learning spaces is obvious, where the support model also should include collaboration and a community of practice. A community where the members communicate regularly to improve their skills and knowledge in their common professional domain. The aim of this paper is to describe and analyse the development of a support model that involves these aspects. Findings confirm the necessity of the four steps in the earlier model, at the same time as they indicate the need for a fifth step facilitating the creation of Communities and Landscapes of Practice. The use of the model may support higher education institutions in creating beneficial conditions for hybrid work-integrated continuous professional development for industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on the Second Conference of the European Philosophy of Science Association, EPSA09, held in VU University Amsterdam, Netherlands in 2009. This was reportedly in tradition of organizing biennial meetings to discuss philosophy of science. Individuals contributed papers and also symposia were also programmed. Three invited speakers from different countries and different subfields also gave plenary lectures.

Meeting the needs of dual-career academic couples has become an important part of university efforts to foster family-friendly workplaces. Many universities have developed formal or informal approaches to addressing dual-career issues, but variation across institutions has made it difficult to detect wider patterns or probe their implications. In this paper, we analyze the dual-career policies and materials (848 documents total) of all R1 institutions in the United States. As with studies from roughly two decades ago, we find deficiencies in institutional support and transparency. However, given reduced state revenues for institutions of higher education and a rise in precarious employment arrangements over the same time period, conditions for academic couples are arguably worse today. In order for universities to address these concerns and contribute meaningfully to broader forms of inclusion, we argue that there is a need for sustained funding commitments and infrastructural support for dual-career programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental degradation has become a major concern around the world. Fostering pro-environmental behaviour is considered among key solutions to reduce impacts towards conservation and rehabilitation of the environment. Various stakeholders have been developing strategies to promote pro-environmental behaviour, especially from an early age that is at student level but environmental issues still prevail on the local and global agenda. Therefore, this makes it questionable about the readiness of learners to change their behaviours towards implementing pro-environmental practices. Literature shows that limited work has been undertaken to assess readiness to change towards pro-environmental behaviour. Taking cognizance of this gap, this paper investigates and analyses the readiness of students towards pro-environmental behaviour by using the Transtheoretical Model of Behaviour Change. A survey was conducted in secondary and higher education institutions in Mauritius. Results showed that demographic factors including gender, level of education and age group had an influence on pro-environmental behaviour. In addition, even though the larger group of participants showed positive attitudes towards protecting the environment, only a smaller percentage had actively changed their behaviours towards a pro-environmental one. As a solution, an integrated framework was proposed in this study to foster pro-environmental behaviour among students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the impact a Russian amended law concerning state secrets is having on science publishing by Russian scientists. It states President Vladimir Putin used a decree in May 2015 expanding the scope of a law requiring scientists get permission from the Federal Security Service prior to publishing results which could have industrial or military applications. It reports Russian universities are requiring scientists seek approval to the publication of any findings without exception.

The quality assurance of higher education in China is an issue of vital international interest. To improve the international reputation of the nation's universities, steps must be taken to ensure a sustained focus on the quality assurance within its ranks. This paper is primarily focused on the quality assurance models operational in Chinese universities, the Big data challenges and the legal framework backing them. The paper also discusses the implementation of the models, the extent to which they meet international standards, and how they adhere to prevailing laws. The degree of success in attaining and maintaining quality and evaluation of quality improvement opportunities are also discussed. Some of the solutions recommended in this study are the participation of more teachers and students in quality management, more emphasis of Higher Education Institution (HEI) quality assurance on self-regulation and a learning-oriented approach and conducting sessions to collect anonymous feedback from students to reward staff with best practices. Some of the Quality Assurance practices/models adopted in Chinese Universities are the Ministry of Education (MOE) reviews; the Academic Degree Committee oversight; Higher Education Evaluation Center (HEEC) overview, University self-evaluation according to HEEC Indicators, and the Webometric Ranking Model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article underscores the retraction of a review paper by Massoumeh Ebtekar, an immunologist at Tarbiat Modares University in Tehran, Iran, from an Iranian journal following allegement that it was plagiarized from other scientists's papers. Mohammad Eslami, editor-in-chief of "Iranian Journal of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology" said that the article will be retractred and that the journal will publish an editorial focusing on the policy on the duplication of published materials.

The article presents information on the paper shown to Arnon Lotem, a professor of zoology at Tel-Aviv University in Israel, and his colleague Ido Erev concerning the pay-off odds of choosing two alternatives described verbally to humans and rats. The paper reported on the certainty effect, whereby rats repeatedly faced with the option of receiving either a bigger or lesser reward with certainty preferred the safer option. Moreover, Lotem and his colleagues discovered that both humans and other animals can exhibit certainty or reverse certainty.

The recent development of infrastructure all around the world has resulted in an increasing trend of online examination in universities. The paper is an approach in theory and practical aimed at analyzing the feasibility of sustainable examination in four universities and its environmental impact reducing the paper use terming it as green examination. The paper studied the integration of sustainability through the use of computers and technology in the examination of the universities viz. King Khalid University (KKU), Saudi Arabia, Integral University (IU), India, Aligarh Muslim University (AMU), India, and The Hague University (HU), The Netherlands. The study has analyzed the trend of paper requirement, paper utilized and paper wasted in all the four universities. The environmental impact resulting from reduced paper use has been also analyzed. The feasibility of e-examination, its implementation and the implications has been undertaken in the study. The study concludes that the e-examination can almost make the examinations paperless and feasible in the four universities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Announces the invitation of the "Journal of Academic Ethics" to authors to submit papers for review and potential publication in an issue devoted to universities and corporate responsibility. Discussion on the obligations of the university to promote corporate responsibility; Contact information.

Focuses on the University of Cambridge's plans to purchase scientific writings of Sir Isaac Newton from the Earl of Macclesfield at an auction in England. Intention of the university to unite the papers with their existing collection of Newton's works; Contribution from the United Kingdom Heritage Lottery Fund toward the purchase.

Around the world today, universities are expected to play a unique role as creators of regional growth and innovation. While there appears to be a consensus that the role of universities has been expanded, critiques show that the contribution of universities to their regions is still not well defined. There have been some developments in the literature on the concept of modern universities such as the triple helix, entrepreneurial university and engaged university. However, those concepts focus on enforcing universities' roles in a single domain such as entrepreneurship, innovation, or civic engagement. Little is known about how universities can facilitate regional growth that goes beyond knowledge transfer activities such as spin-off creation, licensing, and patenting. This paper contributes to a more comprehensive understanding of universities' role in regional growth through the theoretical lens of ambidexterity. Using ambidexterity, universities with a regional focus were distinguished from those engaged in research commercialization and traditional third-mission roles. Through two case studies, this study found that teaching, research, and engagement should not be separated, since they can serve both economic and social missions. As a result, a new model of multidextrous universities is proposed where universities meet both economic and social missions through teaching, research, and engagement. Contrary to previous contributions which presented universities as ambidextrous organizations where tension appears only between research commercialization and research publication or between teaching and research, this study suggests that universities need to overcome tensions and incorporate a sense of place in all activities to successfully contribute to regional growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A growing interest for demonstrating prestige and status of higher education institutions has spurred the establishment of several international ranking systems. A major percentage of these rankings include parameters related to scientific productivity. Here, we examined the differences between diverse rankings as well as correlation with bibliometric parameters and disciplines for the top universities. We investigated the top 300 universities from four international rankings, the Times Higher Education World University Ranking (THE), the QS World University Rankings (QS) the ShanghaiRanking-Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) and the U.S.News Best Global Universities Ranking (USNews). The assessed parameters include ranking positions, size related and bibliometrics-related indicators of each selected ranking. The weight of scientometric parameters ranges between 20% (QS) and 75% (USNews). The most important parameters defining ranking positions include citations, international reputation, and the number of researchers, but the correlation strength varies among ranking systems. The absolute number of publications and citations are particularly important in ARWU and USNews rankings, and scientific category normalized (field weighted) citation impact is central in THE and USNews rankings. Our results confirm that universities having outstanding results in rankings using size-independent indicators (QS and THE) compared to others have significantly lower number of students. High impact research can improve position in ARWU and USNews ranking lists. Regarding to different disciplines, the main results show that outstanding universities in THE ranking have higher publication activity in social sciences and universities which perform better in USNews and QS ranking have more publications in science, technology, and medicine fields and lower score in social sciences. In brief, here we present a comprehensive analysis of the correlation between scientometric parameters and university ranking positions, as well as the performance of outstanding universities and their correlation with different disciplines, to help decision makers select parameters for strengthening and to attract the interest of prospective students and their parents via a better understanding of the functions of different ranks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an era where knowledge constitutes a key source of innovation and sustainable competitive advantage, universities are viewed increasingly as engines of growth. This is because they are places where research outcomes that may lead to radical or disruptive changes to practice are produced. Cognisant of this, and its implications for economic development, policy-makers conferred ownership of research outcomes to universities as a means of facilitating commercialisation. This paper, alongside a growing body of literature, questions the prevailing property rights regime, positing that it is sub-optimal in terms of reducing societal benefits coming from commercialisation. More specifically, drawing on the experience of Greater Manchester (England), this paper argues that university ownership implications on the availability of information used in commercialisation decisions. The detachment of entrepreneurs, a direct consequence of property rights, in the transition from disclosure to patenting means that it is not the transfer of technical information (as suggested in the literature) that constitutes the main challenge. Instead, this paper suggests it is 'unknowledge' i.e. information that has yet to be generated in the introduction of something new that impacts commercialisation. The paper suggests that, rather paradoxically, entrepreneurial engagement may be best attained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the filamentous structure of NGC 1275, the giant elliptical galaxy at the center of the Perseus constellation. It mentions that bright streams of gas fan out from NGC 1275 makes it look a bit like a supersized space jellyfish. The astronomer Andrew Fabian and his colleagues at the Institute of Astronomy were able to discern how these filaments maintain their structure. Images of the galaxy had already been attained by ground-based telescopes such as the WIYN telescope, which is owned and operated by a consortium comprising the University of Wisconsin, Indiana University and the National Optical Astronomy Observatory.

The article outlines the research conducted by Sakari Kauppinen and colleagues regarding the impact RNA molecules in HØrsholm, Denmark. They collaborated with RxGen and Standford University in California wherein they have successfully blocked the activity of one type of microRNA in non-human primates and the compound they developed is a potential treatment for hepatitis C. It also reveals that microRNAs regulate protein synthesis by binding to the messenger RNAs that provide the recipe for protein construction, repressing the relevant protein's production.

The article focuses on the effort of Douglas Hofmann to produce a new class of resistive bulk metallic glasses. In 2003, he studied the materials engineering program together with his college teacher William Johnson at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in California. He further knew the concept of ductility to the glasses. He decided to apply the induction coil, an instrument which conducts heat over a lower range of temperature. Based on the subsequent analysis, he learned that two phases are formed when the glass composites are heated in the temperature range above the melting point of glass and below the dendrite's temperature.

The article describes how Jay Keasling, a synthetic chemist at the University of California, Berkeley, and his team have engineered yeast cells to produce an important precursor for a drug to treat malaria. Keasling collaborated with Amyris Biotechnologies and non-profit drug company Institute for OneWorld Health to try to complete the synthesis of artemisinin. The research was funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Focuses on Australian university publications. Choice of performance indicators; Incentive for placement in a prestigious journal.

The construction of green campus is related to the global sustainable development. Under the guidance of campus energy-saving policy, China's green campus mainly focuses on campus' energy saving. In contrast, the green campus in the USA pays more attention to environmental problems. This study focuses on the impact of "energy saving" on the sustainable development of green campus. On the one hand, it puts forward targeted optimization suggestions for the Chinese universities. On the other hand, it provides the experience reference and new development ideas for the global campus sustainability. Based on the characteristics of the development mode of green campus in China and the USA, this paper studies the motivation of "energy saving" to "sustainability" in the construction of green campus in China. In terms of research methods, this paper selects Zhejiang University a typical representative of China's green campus that combined with the comparative group of four American universities and conducts a quantitative analysis of G-value and S-value that represented energy consumption and sustainability, respectively. Zhejiang University's G-value (0.019) in 2016 is one-sixth of that of the comparative group in the same period, indicating that the implementation effect of the energy-saving monitoring platform is remarkable. From 2014 to 2017, the G-values are basically stable at 0.02, indicating that its future development potential is insufficient. Zhejiang University's scores in the four categories of S-value are significantly lower than those in the comparative group, showing that there are great differences in the construction achievements of the five universities. According to the score rate of 17 sub-items of S-value, the five universities have different advantages and disadvantages. Therefore, the green campus construction of China's case university is too one-sided and only stays at the level of energy conservation. The diversification of construction and the balanced development of all aspects should be paid more attention in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: STEM fields are instrumental in increasing the technological and innovative capacity of the economy. As women are underrepresented in the STEM workforce, diverse strategies have been implemented to boost their preparedness and interest in these fields, including early exposure to academic and vocational STEM courses. Using the case of Chile's highly differentiated school system, this paper examines the role of secondary curricula on students' enrollment and persistence in STEM programs offered by vocational postsecondary institutions and universities. In doing so, we seek to identify whether exposure to STEM courses within the academic or vocational tracks translates into fewer gender differences in STEM higher education. Results: Our results reveal that upper-secondary tracks connected to STEM courses are positively associated with enrollment in STEM higher education and, to some degree, persistence. More specifically, exposure to STEM courses in the academic track is the most effective path to boost chances of enrolling in STEM university programs but has no connection to later persistence. In contrast, applied STEM courses within the vocational tracks perform better in the case of STEM programs in postsecondary vocational institutions both in enrollment and persistence. However, this STEM pipeline significantly amplifies gender gaps as males benefit more than women from early exposure to applied STEM courses. We also found that other indirect routes, such as enrolling in STEM university programs from the vocational track with applied STEM courses, boost female participation in these programs, helping reduce gender gaps. Conclusions: While secondary STEM courses attract more female students to STEM higher education, they alone are insufficient to achieve gender equality in STEM fields as gender gaps widen in the more effective routes. In highly differentiated school systems, policymakers and high school leaders should offer increased support to women interested in STEM studies and careers across all secondary tracks to boost female participation in STEM fields. At the same time, all high school students should be able to select both academic and applied STEM courses as a part of their non-mandatory curriculum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The low-carbon-oriented methods to evaluate college campuses are insufficient, and the indexes are not quantified effectively, which is a normal problem in the world. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a comprehensive low-carbon-oriented evaluation method. Evaluation index system of low-carbon campuses is built that comprehensively considers both subjective and objective factors, which include management mechanism construction, low-carbon culture construction, renewable energy use and other emission reduction measures and propose quantitative evaluation methods by the analytic hierarchy process for subjective empowerment and the entropy weight method for objective empowerment. Both original data and experts' experience are integrated to quantify the index. The result of final comprehensive index weights was management mechanism construction weights 0.137, low-carbon culture construction weights 0.097, renewable energy use weights 0.040 and other emission reduction measures weights 0.123. The validity and discrimination of the method in this paper can be verified by being employed on multiple universities in a municipality. By comparison, the result of the weight of index of low carbon campus was highly corresponding to the soring result of the campuses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Students are increasingly relying on contract cheating (CC), a phenomenon in which a third party completes the assignment, quiz, or homework for students in exchange for a fee. Using an exploratory qualitative method and underpinned by critical theory and social responsibility theory, this study explored the perceptions of faculty members regarding CC in the United Arab Emirates' (UAE's) higher education institutions. In particular, this study addressed how faculty members perceive and deal with CC in contexts where policies towards the practice are absent from higher institution honour codes. Using thematic analysis, the results showed that CC arouses the indignation of faculty and staff to the violation of individual and religious rights. Also, they believe they have a sense of responsibility towards students and the community. The results also showed that faculty members' hesitation in reporting CC incidents was due to their perceived lack of support from higher administration institutions and the lack of clear procedures in ethical manuals. This paper concludes with practical recommendations for faculty and staff, managers, department heads and decision makers to mitigate this phenomenon proactively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The lack of racial diversity in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines is perhaps one of the most challenging issues in the United States higher education system. The issue is not only concerning diverse students, but also diverse faculty members. One important contributing factor is the faculty hiring process. To make progress toward equity in hiring decisions, it is necessary to better understand how applicants are considered and evaluated. In this paper, we describe and present our study based on a survey of current STEM faculty members and administrators who examined applicant qualifications and characteristics in STEM faculty hiring decisions. Results: There are three key findings of the present research. First, we found that faculty members placed different levels of importance on characteristics and qualifications for tenure track hiring and non-tenure track hiring. For example, items related to research were more important when evaluating tenure track applicants, whereas items related to teaching and diversity were more important when evaluating non-tenure track applicants. Second, faculty members' institutional classification, position, and personal identities (e.g., gender, race/ethnicity) had an impact on their evaluation criteria. For instance, we found men considered some diversity-related items more important than women. Third, faculty members rated the importance of qualifications with diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI)-related constructs significantly lower than qualifications that did not specify DEI-related constructs, and this trend held for both tenure track and non-tenure track faculty hiring. Conclusions: This study was an attempt to address the issue of diversity in STEM faculty hiring at institutions of higher education by examining how applicant characteristics are considered and evaluated in faculty hiring practices. Emphasizing research reputation and postdoctoral reputation while neglecting institutional diversity and equitable and inclusive teaching, research, and service stunt progress toward racial diversity because biases—both implicit and explicit, both positive and negative—still exist. Our results were consistent with research on bias in recruitment, revealing that affinity bias, confirmation bias, and halo bias exist in the faculty hiring process. These biases contribute to inequities in hiring, and need to be addressed before we can reach, sustain, and grow desired levels of diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent decades, higher education institutions around the world have come to depend on complex digital infrastructures. In addition to registration, financial, and other operations platforms, digital classroom tools with built-in learning analytics capacities underpin many course delivery options. Taken together, these intersecting digital systems collect vast amounts of data from students, staff, and faculty. Educators' work environments—and knowledge about their work environments—have been shifted by this rise in pervasive datafication. In this paper, we overview the ways faculty in a variety of institutional status positions and geographic locales understand this shift and make sense of the datafied infrastructures of their institutions. We present findings from a comparative case study (CCS) of university educators in six countries, examining participants' knowledge, practices, experiences, and perspectives in relation to datafication, while tracing patterns across contexts. We draw on individual, systemic, and historical axes of comparison to demonstrate that in spite of structural barriers to educator data literacy, professionals teaching in higher education do have strong and informed ethical and pedagogical perspectives on datafication that warrant greater attention. Our study suggests a distinction between the understandings educators have of data processes, or technical specifics of datafication on campuses, and their understanding of big picture data paradigms and ethical implications. Educators were found to be far more knowledgeable and comfortable in paradigm discussions than they were in process ones, partly due to structural barriers that limit their involvement at the process level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Faced with the most recent changes of the times, expectations of the nation and mission of universities, college students have been playing a major role in their respective university and become increasingly engaged in the development of universities and colleges. They are critical thinkers who are willing to undertake their responsibilities, and they have a strong sense of equality, legal awareness and consciousness for protecting their rights. In addition, in terms of the campus environment where they live, the needs of these college students vary from each other, and their demands for interest deserve much attention from both universities and the entire society. This paper intends to explore the status-quo of how contemporary college students' demands are expressed, guided and handled in the cyberspace environment, and based on our analysis, we aim to put forward targeted suggestions of optimization. We have adopted the method of questionnaire survey to investigate the mechanism on the expression and guidance of contemporary college students' demands in the cyberspace environment. By using such softwares as Excel, SPSS and Amos in our statistical analysis, we have established the model on the expression and guidance of contemporary college students' demands in the cyberspace environment, which provides theoretical support for the endeavor of colleges and universities in this respect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The potential for a functional 'triple helix' to contribute to economic development is being increasingly accepted and embraced, particularly the bilateral relationship between higher education institutions (HEIs) and business. However, university-business cooperation (UBC) is still a fragmented and indistinct field of research, and the understanding of UBC remains inadequate since most research is undertaken around specific elements, rather than as an encompassing, overarching and interconnected system. This paper aims fills this gap in the literature by putting the pieces together to create an integrated and comprehensive conceptual UBC framework for HEIs, the UBC Ecosystem. The framework illustrates the components present in the UBC environment for HEIs, such as inputs, activities, outcomes, outputs, impacts, supporting mechanisms, circumstances and context, specifying a wide range of sub-elements for each of them. In doing so, this paper makes a strong theoretical contribution with the creation of a conceptual framework, highlighting the more important elements and their interrelations as well as suggesting future research. Additionally, the paper makes a practical contribution, establishing a common UBC schema for HEI managers and policymakers to make strategic and operative decisions, and used as a base for evidence-based management and policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several conclusions may be drawn from the information we have presented here. First and without doubt, the University of Chicago is by far the most dominant force overall, and is particularly so with respect to the production of pages and papers published in the Journal of Law and Economics. The George Mason-Virginia Tech influence is strong with respect to Public Choice, but is not, in our opinion, dominant. One does not necessarily need to be located at a large, research-oriented school in order to publish in either journal, but these schools are the source of most contributions. This is particularly true of the JLE but significantly less so for PC. The source of contributions is very broad, but top 50 institutions account for the lion's share. Contributions by persons employed at foreign institutions are important, particularly for PC. The analysis of papers and pages by degree schools of authors reveals that, while economists dominate, other disciplines are important, especially political science with respect to PC; law and business-related disciplines for JLE. These data also show that, while Chicago faculty contribute only marginally to PC, Chicago graduates exert a very strong influence. The influence of Chicago on the JLE is really notable when we rank institutions by the total contributions of both faculty and graduates, and when we rank the top 25 contributors to each journal. We hope that this paper will provide information useful to those interested, for whatever reason, in institutional and individual publishing performance with respect to the two journals. For us, the process has been difficult and time consuming, but also greatly interesting and rewarding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper was developed within the scope of a PhD thesis that intends to characterize the use of mobile applications by the students of the University of Aveiro during class time. The main purpose of this paper is to present the results of an initial pilot study that aimed to fine-tune data collection methods in order to gather data that reflected the practices of the use of mobile applications by students in a higher education institution during classes. In this paper we present the context of the pilot, its technological settings, the analysed cases and the discussion and conclusions carried out to gather mobile applications usage data logs from students of an undergraduate degree on Communication Technologies. Our study gathered data from 77 participants, taking theoretical classes in the Department of Communication and Arts at the University of Aveiro. The research was based on the Grounded Theory method approach aiming to analyse the logs from the access points of the University. With the collected data, a profile of the use of mobile devices during classes was drawn. The preliminary findings suggest that the use of apps during the theoretical classes of the Department of Communication and Art is quite high and that the most used apps are Social networks like Facebook and Instagram. During this pilot the accesses during theoretical classes corresponded to approximately 11,177 accesses per student. We also concluded that the students agree that accessing applications can distract them during these classes and that they have a misperception about their use of online applications during classes, as the usage time is, in fact, more intensive than what participants reported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a global crisis, one which also influences the ways sustainability is being taught at universities. This paper undertakes an analysis of the extent to which COVID-19 as a whole and the lockdown it triggered in particular, which has led to the suspension of presence-based teaching in universities worldwide and influenced teaching on matters related to sustainable development. By means of a worldwide survey involving higher education institutions across all continents, the study has identified a number of patterns, trends and problems. The results from the study show that the epidemic has significantly affected teaching practices. The lockdowns have led to a surge in the use of on-line communication tools as a partial replacement to normal lessons. In addition, many faculty teaching sustainability in higher education have strong competencies in digital literacy. The sampled higher education educations have—as a whole—adequate infrastructure to continue to teach during the lockdowns. Finally, the majority of the sample revealed that they miss the interactions via direct face-to-face student engagement, which is deemed as necessary for the effective teaching of sustainability content. The implications of this paper are two-fold. Firstly, it describes how sustainability teaching on sustainable development has been affected by the lockdown. Secondly, it describes some of the solutions deployed to overcome the problem. Finally, the paper outlines the fact that the COVID-19 pandemic may serve the purpose of showing how university teaching on sustainability may be improved in the future, taking more advantage of modern information technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to large energy consumption and equipped building control systems, the majority of campus buildings have the potential to increase energy efficiency and provide energy flexibility. Among the three main types of occupants in the campus buildings (researchers/teachers, students, administration/management), students spend most of their time on learning activities in the campus buildings, and the energy performance can influence their learning performance. Therefore, this paper conducts a questionnaire targeting student occupants at a large engineering faculty in a Danish university to investigate occupants' experience of energy control, indoor comfort, and options of energy flexibility in campus buildings. In total, 267 fully completed and usable questionnaires were received. The dataset is available in.xlsx format, and the questionnaire that was used to collect the data is also provided together. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 enabled American universities to engage in technology transfer. Thirty years of research has investigated the legislation's effectiveness and derivative university practices, such as the establishment of technology transfer offices. Unfortunately, the technology transfer literature has focused primarily on patenting as the primary transfer vehicle for protecting intellectual property in universities, overlooking other forms of IP ownership, such as copyrights. Legal scholarship shows, however, that universities are increasingly using copyrights to protect their intellectual property and that the number of university-held copyrights exceeds patents. This paper examines the use of copyrights to protect and transfer university IP. It does so by reviewing underlying legal and policy concepts associated with copyrights and offers contemporary examples of copyright issues within universities. The paper therefore provides a foundation for future research on the role of copyrights in technology transfer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses about the Chinese government investing in universities and research institutes. Topics include the increase in researchers and research articles in China, and fundamental reforms needed to improve the quality of research. Recruiting world class professionals and mentoring junior staff, assessing the salary and promotion of the faculty every three years, and merged tenure system are also mentioned. The steps taken at Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) are also given.

Governance issues, here interpreted as the provisions of adequate policy frameworks characterized by reliability and accountability, coupled with resources to support their implementation, are known to be the basis for the implementation of sustainable development measures. This paper discusses the influence of governance in the ways sustainability is perceived and practiced in a higher education context. Apart from due considerations to the role of governance as the basis for regulation and institutional actions and management decisions, this paper reports on an empirical study undertaken in a sample of higher education institutions. This study entailed an analysis of sustainable development policies, certification, organizational structure, budget, reports, team for sustainability, staff training, and challenges for the integration of sustainability and governance. The results suggest that even though there are different opinions and attitudes on the role of governance, it is regarded as an important component in supporting efforts by higher education institutions to include considerations on sustainable development as part of their strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the first systematic investigation into the search engine optimization practices of major contract cheating websites in the United States. From a business perspective, visibility in organic search engine results is considered one of the top client recruitment tools. The current understanding of student recruitment strategies by these companies remains largely unexplored in both academic literature and popular press. Replicating the business research practices used in the search engine optimization industry, comprehensive search engine ranking and traffic data was obtained for the 38 largest contract cheating websites in the US. The overall objective was to illuminate the strategies that these companies take to get their services at the top of the search results of as many students as possible – not just the relatively small proportion of students actively cheating. The results show that these companies dominate the search results for not just students searching to cheat, but also for naïve search efforts, when students are simply doing genuine research or classwork. These nefarious companies use highly sophisticated search engine manipulation strategies to bait naïve student searchers onto their sites, thus enabling the potential to switch them to cheaters. Higher education institutions, armed with the specific details provided in this study, can use the strategies outlined in the discussion to directly and negatively impact on the success of these contract cheating services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Higher education institutions often struggle with increased dropout rates, academic underachievement, and delayed graduations. One way in which these challenges can potentially be addressed is by better leveraging the student data stored in institutional databases and online learning platforms to predict students' academic performance early using advanced computational techniques. Several research efforts have focused on developing systems that can predict student performance. However, there is a need for a solution that can predict student performance and identify the factors that directly influence it. This paper aims to develop a model that accurately identifies students who are at risk of low performance, while also delineating the factors that contribute to this phenomenon. The model employs explainable machine learning (ML) techniques to delineate the factors that are associated with low performance and integrates rule-based model risk flags with the developed prediction system to improve the accuracy of performance predictions. This helps low-performing students to improve their academic metrics by implementing remedial actions that address the factors of concern. The model suggests proper remedial actions by mapping the students' performance in each identified checkpoint with the course learning outcomes (CLOs) and topics taught in the course. The list of possible actions is mapped to this checkpoint. The developed model can accurately distinguish students at risk (total grade < 70 % ) from students with good performance. The Area under the ROC Curve (AUC ROC) of binary classification model fed with four checkpoints reached 1.0. Proposed framework may aid the student to perform better, increase the institution's effectiveness and improve their reputations and rankings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines higher education efforts linking United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs) and agri-food system sustainability given reports of stagnant movement for SDG2 in Southeast Asia and lack of data for effective monitoring or evaluation to realize the 2030 Agenda. It discusses Thai contexts amid a growing global movement in academic theory, policy and practice to mainstream SDG knowledge and implementation across campuses presenting one case to illustrate broader concerns. Chulalongkorn University policies, faculty awareness, curricula, research, sustainability reporting and partnerships about SDGs have contributed to SDG2 objectives from different disciplines and academic units. However, some faculty still lack understanding of SDGs generally while SDG2 has not been an institutional priority. The university has made welcome progress since a 2017 policy promoting SDGs but still needs to strengthen SDG2 data collection, teaching, research and community outreach capacities including links to government and international reporting to address complex agri-food system sustainability challenges. Comparative studies could also help while critically debating SDG deficiencies and promoting socioeconomic, ecological, agri-food system, community and campus sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the UniCorT tool designed to solve university course timetabling problems specifically tailored for the 2019 International Timetabling Competition (ITC 2019). The proposed approach includes pre-processing, the use of a maximum satisfiability (MaxSAT) solver and a local search procedure. UniCorT is assessed with the benchmark instances from the ITC 2019. The impact of a handful of techniques in the quality of the solution and the execution time is evaluated. We take into account different pre-processing techniques and conjunctive normal form (CNF) encodings, as well as the combination with a local search procedure. The success of our tool is attested by having been ranked among the five finalists of the ITC 2019 competition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the author explores his experience as editor of the journal. He mentions that manuscript submissions to the journal come from the universities of China, India and Central Asia. He includes that the journal became the official journal of the Asia Academy of Management. He also informs about the winner of the 2012 Mike Peng Best Paper Award who received the honor for a research paper on the meta-analysis of the Asian firms' performance.

The paper has twofold goals. The paper reviews the culture of entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial competencies in Palestine. It is characterized by donor-supported and non-governmental-initiated trainings. This demands an urgent active involvement of universities in the field of entrepreneurship that is shaped in the form of Research and Development as well as offering entrepreneurship academic programs. This comes in line with the emerging trend of offering courses and programs at universities worldwide. Furthermore, the paper proposes a softcomputing-based entrepreneurial key competencies' model (SKECM). This tool is capable of predicting/judging the overall quality of entrepreneurial competencies. SKECM is based on the three-cluster, ten key entrepreneurial competencies developed and used by Empretec. A three-stage, 14 different models have been developed and validated by hundreds of randomly generated datasets. Measures were used to validate the adequacy of these models including, the mean average percentage errors and the maximum percentage errors. The best achieved values for these measures are 0.8511 and 6.3175, respectively. However, although the preliminary findings of the proposed SKECM model are promising, more testing is still required before stating the adequacy of applying the softcomputing modeling approach in the entrepreneurship field (This is to state that there are no financial competing interests (political, personal, religious, ideological, academic, intellectual, commercial, or any other) to declare in relation to this manuscript). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]